I ordered a Dell Latitude E6400 laptop in February to replace my four-year-old Latitude D600. On the promised ship date I received an email from Dell stating that the order had been delayed a week. A series of promised ship dates came and went, with a new delay each time. The last iteration increased the delay from 7 to 12 days. Repeated calls to customer service gave a number of reasons for the delay (out of stock on the CPU; Intel isn't shipping us CPUs; waiting for the video card; and one "we have to call another division to find out"). I was left with the impression that divisions within Dell weren't talking to each other. I finally canceled the order. After some careful research, I ordered an HP EliteBook with nearly identical features and within $50 of the same price. The HP unit arrived a week *before* its promised ship date. I've been a loyal Dell customer for years, and have generally had good experience with Dell, but this time was different. I have to say I really like the HP unit.

10:25 pm April 15, 2009

Gary wrote:

I have been looking to buy a Dell PC for about 4 months now and I have to say that the configuration I was eying in December is still priced roughly the same now in April...so I would have to agree with the pricing comment at the end of the article (of course my data is not exactly scientific).

12:39 am April 16, 2009

Phil wrote:

I think Ray's onto something. Seems like they've got some real forecasting or manufacturing problems. I've read where some of the new consumer systems have waits of three weeks or longer.

2:21 am April 16, 2009

Ray Cowan wrote:

I agree with Phil. Clearly there were difficulties of some sort in February. While I was waiting for my Dell to ship, my company was receiving new Dell laptops as usual. Maybe Dell was focusing more on fulfilling corporate orders and less on consumer orders.

3:19 am April 16, 2009

Robert wrote:

Dell has been on the decline for some time now. I don't see how Michael Dell's "return" to the company's helm has helped at all. I had always heard that Dell's strength was in its turnkey manufacturing process and ability to ship products efficiently and promptly. That was supposedly the case years ago. I guess that's not the case now?

7:46 am April 16, 2009

Former Dell User wrote:

Dell's initial success was in part because they had a good product with excellent warranty supported by people who spoke a language one could understand. Dell capitalized on the "Best Warranty Rating", then continued to advertise their apparent position while their accountant-type management essentially eliminated the warranty and moved their support off-shore. After having bought many Dell original systems - they dumped us in warranty calls. We moved to HP totally, having bought several systems. HP's warranty has been excellent with recent response on a drive failure addressed with an on-site technician and offer to provide extended warranty. In our opinion -- one who buys a Dell must consider that the product will essentially be "buyer-be-ware" because you are "on-your-own".

9:46 am April 16, 2009

Former Dell Exec wrote:

Michael is not the answer. In fact, he may be part of the problem. His focus on cost has been devastating to product quality, customer service and employee moral. He'll save a nickel today and sacrifice tomorrows dollars. Sadly, he can't see this. He was great in the day, today is a new day and he like so many others need to move on. Here's my advise..... be and stay close to the customer. Meaning, build you machines locally, service your customers locally and stop outsourcing customer relationships to third parties. All the things that made Dell great have been compromised for a nickel. FYI - Local does not mean US. It means in the local market where your customers are located. Last note, get leaders who have a backbone and are not lapdogs for Michael. i.e. head of HR

9:49 am April 16, 2009

Former Dell Exec wrote:

Look for a Dell annoucement that has a message, we plan on saving a lot more nickels. Translation - We have not learned our lesson and therefore we'll drive this company further into the ground and not even know it.

4:53 pm April 16, 2009

Gordon wrote:

There are few second acts in the tech business, Steve Jobs at Apple is the notable exception. Michael Dell returning to Dell looks a lot like Ted Waitt returning to Gateway or Craig Benson returning to Cabletron. At least they know where to find the light switch so they can finally turn it off when they finish running their once-powerful companies into the ground. Once other companies matched Dell's supply chain optimization, Dell had nothing to provide a competitive advantage. They were always inexpensive, but now they are also cheap. Good products at an inexpensive price is a good value; cheap products at a cheap price are just junk..

2:48 pm April 17, 2009

ca36ma wrote:

this two last years Dell effort, was for trying to grow profit and limit the damage on the market share and on Dell employees.... which is not so stupide.... there is no glory in having the big share in the market with no/small profit and firing a lot of people.... if it works for dell we may see a complete different situation in few quarters.

Add a Comment

Error message

Name

We welcome thoughtful comments from readers. Please comply with our guidelines. Our blogs do not require the use of your real name.